Brent Mason: A Chameleon in Tune Town

After accidentally riveting a
hole completely through
his thumb while working at a
toolbox factory, Brent Mason
realized that if he didn’t follow
his dream of becoming a
professional guitarist, sooner
or later that dream wouldn’t
be an option. So the native of
Van Wert, Ohio, hit the road
at age 21 and headed straight
for Nashville. Not long after
arriving in “Music City,” Mason
became a fixture on the studio
scene. He eventually became
the No. 1 session player in town
and one of the most-recorded
guitarists in history. Along
the way, he’s won countless
awards, including a Grammy
for Best Country Instrumental
Performance (with Brad Paisley,
Albert Lee, and John Jorgenson,
among others), CMA Musician
of the Year (twice), and the
Academy of Country Music
Guitarist of the Year—which
he’s pulled off an astonishing
12 times. In addition to being a
consummate hired gun, Mason
is also a highly regarded virtuoso
solo artist.

The road to becoming the
“Nashville Session King” began
in the late ’80s, when Mason
scored a gig as a songwriter
for CBS Songs. He co-wrote
numerous songs and played all
of their guitar parts. When the
songs were later pitched to artists
and producers, the question
out of their mouths was always,
“Who’s playing guitar on that?”
And when many of them found
out it was Mason, they’d seek
him out for their recordings.
Higher-profile artists like Keith
Whitley also took notice—Mason played and co-wrote
tracks such as “Heartbreak
Highway” from I Wonder Do
You Think of Me, Whitley’s final
album before his tragic passing.
Soon, Mason became first-call
on just about every A-list session,
including those for albums
by Reba McEntire, Shania
Twain, Rascal Flatts, Toby
Keith, and Neil Diamond. He
also did soundtrack work for
TV shows like Friends and movies
like A Few Good Men.

The session ace’s new DVD,
Brent Mason: Recording Guitar
[musicPROmedia], offers a
behind-the-scenes look at the
inner workings of a typical
tracking session. The nearly
two-hour video is a must-see
for any guitarist interested in
learning about the creative process
of putting together guitar
parts at a professional level.
Even if you have no interest in
session work, the video offers
useful tips and insights about
creating complementary guitar
parts and choosing the right
gear for the job. A good portion
of the DVD documents
Mason’s process of layering
guitar tracks (it even includes
PDFs of notated transcriptions),
including his rationale
for when to use different
instruments, and how to punch
in tricky parts. At the end, you
get to hear the fully arranged
finished product. Shred fans
will also delight in seeing
Mason record four improvised
passes of a hellacious solo, with
a great moment in the third
pass when Mason adds more
drive to his tone but then stops
cold during the outro solo,
shakes his head, and says, “The
overdrive doesn’t work on this.”

We recently caught up with
Mason to talk about how the
studio scene has changed over
the years, and to get advice on
dealing with the creative and
business aspects of being a working
guitarist. Oh, and of course
we talked chops and gear, too.

What makes a great session
player?
The idea is to walk out of there
with people going, “Wow, he
must play that every day. He lives
and breathes that.” If you sit me
in a studio, I’ll make sure that
by the time I’m out of there it
sounds like I’ve been playing that
music every night. I can go from
a jazz session one day to playing
hillbilly twang on an Alan
Jackson session the next. There
are lots of Nashville guys like
that, who can really play. Even
though everybody correlates my
style with a certain type of country
or country rock, I like and
play jazz and all kinds of music.

Are there any cons to being a
session cat?
The only negative thing about
the studio scene—and I don’t
really want to call it negative—
is that you kind of lose who
you are, because you become
such a chameleon. And you
become such a perfectionist
that, after a while, you might
not like anything anymore. Like
when somebody wants to send
you some music and you start
thinking, “Well, I know it’s not
going to be good, but go ahead
and send it.”

Mason at an outdoor festival with one of his Valley Arts signature guitars,
which features a Gibson mini-humbucker in the neck position, a Duncan Hot
Stack in the middle, and a Duncan Vintage Lead Stack in the back position.

People are recording at home
now more than ever. With the
ease of cutting and pasting,
even non-musicians today are
putting out tracks from pasted
loops. How has that affected
the studio scene?
I could never imagine someone
like Ray Charles or the Beatles
doing that. If we did that on
everything, it would become
boring and stagnant after a
while. I think that’s the charm
of recording, to have a realistic
approach and spontaneity.

There’s still a lot of the human
element left here in Nashville,
with people recording tracks
together, which is my favorite
way of cutting tracks—having
everybody in front of each other,
all in one room for one session to
get the right vibe going.

Do you have to play all the way
through a whole track anymore?
I play through the whole track.
That’s the ideal thing. There
will be some overdubbing after
that. I know I’ve done some
things where everything was
pieced together and sent over
the internet. But you can copy
[and loop] some things without
it being too noticeable—like a
pop or disco-type song, where
it’s just constant repetition.

You’re actually making yourself
available for session work
over the internet now, right?
Yeah. I can see that it’s kind of the
wave of the future. It’s inevitable.
Ironically, most of that isn’t from
Nashville. It’s from all around the
world—England, Ireland, Cuba
[laughs]. [The clients] send specific
information on what they’re
looking for. Like, they might ask
for a twangy baritone part for one
section and a Buck Owens-type
part for another section, or ask for
a more rockin’ ZZ Top vibe. We’ll
discuss everything before I start to
record, and I’ve never really had
any discrepancies.

Do you prefer working alone
to a studio session?
There are good parts and bad
parts about it. You don’t see other
players. You sit around in your
pajamas and do your parts, and
then you get cabin fever after a
while. The plus is that you can
really zero in on some great guitar
tones, and you can do the ultimate
solo. In Nashville, we record
so much that you might only get
like 15 minutes to record a solo.

Mason in the studio with his ’76 ES-335 and a red Matchless DC30 barely visible behind
the music stand.

But does taking away that
time limit ever lead to obsessing
over minute details that
may not be that important
rather than just sending out
a perfectly good track?
I don’t overthink it. I’ve been
doing this for years. I can get a
good solo and it wouldn’t take all
day. I’ll do a couple of solos and
they can pick out the one they
want. You just play what you hear,
and if it’s soulful and it moves
you, it’ll probably move them.

Because there’s no immediate
feedback, what happens
if parts come out differently
than the client expects?
It’s no big deal. If they say, “Can
you redo this?” I’ll just call it up
and knock it out. But if they
wait too long, it might be a laborious
thing—because you have
to go back through [the digital
files], find it, and get the sounds
again. It’s more about when
you’re all set up and ready with
the tones, because when you go
on to something else, your mind
goes to something else.

Another option is you can
always Skype or iChat somebody
while you’re doing something.
You just have to know if
they’re going to be pleasant to
work with. You can always shut
them off if they’re assholes.

New York City native Joe Charupakorn is a guitarist, author, and editor. He has interviewed the world’s biggest guitar icons including Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Yngwie Malmsteen, Carlos Santana, Neal Schon, and Dave Davies, among many others, for Premier Guitar. Additionally, he has written over 20 instructional books for Hal Leonard Corporation. His books are available worldwide and have been translated into many languages. Visit him on the web at joecharupakorn.com.

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